It is an axiom of medicine that medical devices invading or associating with a patient's body are required to be extremely clean, if not sterilized. This is particularly true with instruments, such as endoscopes and bronchoscopes, which pass through a body orifice, such as the urethra, anus, etc. Unless these instruments are sterilized between uses, the opportunities for passing disease-bearing organisms between patients are enhanced.
Sterilizing medical devices generally requires gas-sterilization. The process usually takes twenty-four hours and, as such, is not practical for instruments used several times a day. Instead, many instruments are soaked in a germicidal solution that is of questionable efficacy. The soaking takes at least ten minutes, which is advantageous over the gas sterilization process. However, the germicidal solutions tend to be caustic and will cause the premature destruction of the medical devices.
Several alternatives are contemplated to resolve this problem. The use of disposable instruments, such as disposable endoscopes, has been suggested. However, this would result in an unjustifiably high cost.